


Marked Days

by Assassin_J



Category: Dishonored (Video Games)
Genre: Canon Compliant, Dishonored 2 Spoilers, Gen, Hmnnn hey it's my first Dishonored fic, My First Work in This Fandom, POV Corvo Attano
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-01
Updated: 2017-11-01
Packaged: 2019-01-28 02:05:08
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 798
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12595688
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Assassin_J/pseuds/Assassin_J
Summary: Writember Day 1 - "Beginning/End"Corvo POV on his first and last day of bearing the Outsider's Mark.





	Marked Days

**Author's Note:**

> added a little more on August 11 2018

On Corvo's first day with the Mark, he had felt an uneasy sickness in his gut.

Part of that sickness was anxiety on being sprung from his cell by an anonymous person or persons with an unknown agenda.

Part of that sickness was culturally-ingrained distrust of the Void and the Outsider, especially since these same sort of powers had ruined his happiness, had killed his beloved, had stolen his dear child.

Part of that sickness was the lurch in his bones whenever he used this new power, stepping across space in the blink of an eye.

The third part- the lurch- was the quickest to get over. It became familiar, that sensation of touching on the Void.

 

* * *

 

On Corvo's last day with the Mark, he felt the same uneasy sickness in his gut.

He felt anxiety on the arrival of the shifty Duke of Serkonos, especially with his gift of ominous Clockwork Soldiers, sharp and towering over the people, all-too-reminiscent of the old Tallboys, but lacking even the Tallboys' humanity.

He felt distrust at Delilah's claim of sisterhood to Jessamine, who had never mentioned any long-lost family.

He felt a lurch in his bones when she reached out with strange magic, stranger than any he'd seen in the Void or the Empire until now, and pulled his Mark from his skin with a cold high laugh.

And then he was frozen there with this sickness in his gut, for a span of days and weeks he couldn't count. He couldn't even close his eyelids as every loyal friend of their family was brutally dispatched by mechanical blades.

 

* * *

 

Yells and screams and general chaos of the city reached his ears from time to time. He would have preferred Delilah to just have killed him, rather than leave him in this torment.

Constantly he wondered where Emily was.

_Constantly._

His unending hope that she'd escaped was the master line keeping him tethered.

 

* * *

 

And then one day, instead of the usual noise of Delilah's Dunwall, he heard the proud voice of his daughter blasting from a loudspeaker, promising to take down the false empress.

The sickness left from Corvo immediately on those words, and he would've smiled and cried were he not still a prisoner to the stone.

For two more hours, there was more noise of fighting and clashing, of screaming witches and falling objects and breaking vials. And then an opening door. And then Emily was there, and she freed him, and he gasped, feeling his chest expand with air that tasted of blood and dust but was still so _so_ appreciated.

Legs weak, he fell into her arms. She was strong; she didn't waver with his weight.

"Corvo!"

He realized she was crying; dry tears, happy tears. And he was crying too; more intensely, more wetly.

"I'm all right, Em." He took another breath and gripped her forearm for support. "Is Delilah-"

"She's gone," Emily said bluntly. No tears now. "Trapped in a cage of her own making." As she spoke, she took the kerchief from around her neck and began to dab at Corvo's tears. "And the Duke of Serkonos, he's-"

"Emily," Corvo said with a start, because he'd just seen the stark scarring on the back of her hand as she moved to wipe the other side of his face.

She felt his rush of tense emotion, heard the odd sharpness in his voice, and mistook these for signs of distress. "What's wrong?"

Corvo shook his head. "It's nothing wrong, no." He stood back fully then, upright on his own legs rather than falling forward as he'd been posed when petrified. "But this-" He took her hand gently, and ran the pad of his thumb over that familiar shape. "He came to you."

Emily was silent a second before answering. "Yes. Just like in your stories." Corvo had told her many such stories in her childhood. By now she'd realized that much of those tales were crafted from his own experience.

Corvo laughed, very quietly. "Like father, like daughter. It's a strange sort of honor we share. He only speaks to 'the most interesting' of us."

"I don't care about being interesting," Emily said, tugging her hand away and rewrapping a strip of cloth over the Mark. "I care about remaking the Empire, better and stronger and happier than before." She looked at Corvo. "And it's no honor, but a dishonor, considering that he gave Delilah the Mark too."

Corvo hummed a moment, nodding. "I can't fathom how he makes his decisions." Then he stepped forward and put a hand on Emily's shoulder after brushing some dust from it. "But I'd be honored to work with you to remake the Empire."

Emily smiled, and they walked together out the doors of Dunwall tower into the light.


End file.
